Adding New Characters Without Starting The Game Over?

In my game Star-Shift, I have a lot of playable characters, maybe like 100 of them.



If I make a fresh character in Actor's tab (before starting a new game), everything works fine in-game.

If however I start to make the character after I have already started the game, the character will always join the team as a blank character.

This means that if I want to add new characters I either have to add them ahead of time before starting a new game or I have to start the game over again when adding new characters.

But at this time, my game takes about 5 hours for me to beat if I play all the way through, so this is somewhat cumbersome.

Is there any way to be able to add characters after you've already started/saved a game?

Any suggestions would be helpful.

You mean adding characters to party? if yes you have to create them all before starting the game and then add them to the party using events

I know how to add them to the party. The thing is though that sometimes I don't automatically know which characters I want to create until I'm in that part of the game. It would be nice to get around it to the point where you can create the character after starting/saving a game in the right spot.

I have been using RPG Maker since RPG Maker 95 and definitely know how to add the team members using events.

This is specifically regarding the creation of characters after game save has already happened.

You have to differ between two parts:
adding the actor to the database and adding the actor to the party.

if an actor is created in the database and added to the game party by an event only after the saved game is loaded then there should be no problem.
If that is what you do and you still end up with a blank actor, then something is wrong either in your engine or in the way how you add the actor - please post screenshots of the event and what you get in the party after that.

Ok. When I add the actor to the database after I have already started a game, then later when I go to add the character to the team, they are blank.

If I add the character to the database ahead of time, everything works normally when adding them to the team later.

My game is getting pretty long at this point, so I am having to play the entire game over again to add a new character, if I did not put that character into the database before starting the game.

Example, later in my game you end up at a missile control system, it's a point of the game where you go inside the computer/into cyberspace.



I had started a new save/game about a week ago, and I didn't know that I was going to do cyberspace in this part of the game until I got here.

Then at this point I went to make a new character in the database (Cyber Rei).



But since I didn't make Cyber Rei before I started playing this game fresh, when I finally add Cyber Rei to the party (in cyberspace), he's just a blank character. Which looks like this:



But if I start the entire game all over again and get to this same point, it's totally normal:



If there's no way to do it by default, is there a way to go into the database after the game has already started and manually add the information? Just looking for a way to create new characters on the fly without having to start my game over again.

@Psychronic screenshots of your maps are useless. I asked for a screenshot of your event, the event that adds the actors so that I can see what commands you used with what options.
I think I know what you're doing wrong in your event, but I need to see it to check it.

You could try a plug in that makes you create character during game? There are a few around. I think it is the only way to do it.

Thanks! Yeah I figure I just gotta live with it, just thought I'd ask though. :)

No, you don't have to life with it.
As I said above I'm pretty sure I know which mistake you made, it's a simple one that is very simple to solve - but I need to see your event page where you add the actor to see if you made that mistake or one of the other possibilities.

So please give the screenshot I asked you for.

I'm not an expert tho, you should show your events to Andar maybe. Just a question: you re writing your game as you play it? I mean story and everything..

Ok, I have been using RPG Maker for years and I know how to add a character. But here's the screenshot anyway. I don't think I'm making any mistakes because everything works fine, I just have to start the whole game over again (or start the game at that point) to get it to work.

The exact screenshot is using a plugin where I can create multiple parties (HIME's Party Manager), but the same thing happens if I just use the standard "Change Party Member" command with plugin turned off.

If the party already has 3 people in it, and I add person #4 (without starting the game over again), it will be a blank character. If I do start the game over again though it works completely normally as it should.

Timeline.

1.Character is blank because it hasn't been created yet.
2. I start new game and play for a few hours until I get to the point I want.
3. I realize that I want to make a character at that point, so I save the game and I start making a character in the editor.
4. After character is created, add an event that adds the character to the team (in that part of the game).
5. Character is added but they are totally blank character.
6. Start the whole game over again and get to the same point again, everything works normally.

I think the reason why this happens is because the characters are called by the program at the very beginning of the game, but not any time after that, as in all the characters get inputted into the database when starting a new game, but if you want to create a new character after that, gotta start the game over again in order for the character to show up in the game.

It's a similar situation to plugins where if you try to add a plugin to your game after you already have a save file mid-way through the game, you'll most likely get an error, until you start game over again, and then suddenly plugin works normally. It's along the same lines.

Some of the better plugins though like Yanfly work anyway often times if you add new plugins mid game, but many of the others don't.

your actors are not correct because they are never initialized - that needs to be done on first adding, or the data will be blank.
Do NOT use the script commands, simply use the event command "change party member" to add a fourth actor - and then use the initialize option on that command.
I don't know the script equivalent of that option - no one adds regular actors by script anymore unless it is a dynamic actor that doesn't exist in the database.

Basically the initialization tells the engine to reset all actor data to base database values. Without initialisation the last stored value is used - which is a blank actor because you have dozens of blank actors in your database.
The idea behind this is that an actor can be added and removed throughout the game and keeps its last info from when he was in the party before, that is why actor data is stored in the savefile if the actor exists.
But you need to tell the engine to load the data from the database by setting the init flag on the event command for adding that actor when adding it the first time to prevent false data from being used.

Psychronic, please avoid double posting, as it is against the forum rules. You can use the "Edit" function on your posts to add additional information you've forgotten or respond to multiple people. You can review our forum rules here. Thank you.

If you want to add something after you posted, please use the 'Edit' button to add to your last post.

It seems like people get confused easily if I am trying to talk about 2 different subjects and that's why they were posted separately. I'll try not to do it again but my posts will just be longer and less clear. Sorry it's such a burden for you guys.



What do you mean by "initialize"? I don't see an option for initializing mid-game. I am fully aware of the "change party member" standard function, but initializing the actors mid-game is something I am not aware of. What is the command to do that?

EDIT:

OHHHH I see the checkbox now. I seriously have been using this software for years and never saw that checkbox before. I feel stupid. THANKS you saved me a lot of time.